


Resurgence

by orphan_account



Series: Resurgence: Rise of the Minutemen [1]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Brotherhood of Steel (Fallout), Commonwealth Minutemen, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, F/M, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, The Institute (Fallout), The Railroad (Fallout), a MUCH larger commonwealth, like it needs to be big, obviously, so it's big
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-08-22
Packaged: 2020-07-10 01:33:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19897684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: A civil war in the Capital Wasteland delays Recon Squad Gladius by six months, and the Commonwealth they arrive in is vastly different to the one they expected. The Commonwealth Minutemen, previously a dying organisation, has made a dramatic resurgence under the command of General Thiel, the Man Out of Time.





	1. Prologue

**Prologue**

**_Arthur_ **

****

“Rivet City has expelled it’s garrison!” A scribe called out from his left.

“Megaton has expelled it’s Brotherhood garrison, Elder!” Came from his right.

“Andale—”

“Arefu—”

“Big Town—”

On and on it went, and Arthur could feel his blood boiling.

“Enough!” He snapped, and the room became silent. “Is there anyone who _hasn’t_ expelled their garrison?”

“Canterbury Commons, sir,” a scribe told him, “and Vault 101 has reaffirmed their desire for their garrison to remain. Other than that…”

  
“Have our garrison’s been attacked?” He asked. “Any of them?”

“No sir, nothing so far to indicate that,” another scribe conceded, “from what we’ve gathered so far, they’ve simply been kicked out. Several have reported that their weapons were confiscated from them, but none have had their armour taken so far—though we’re still receiving reports.”

“Send Vertibirds to recover our men, and bring them back to the Citadel,” he ordered, “contact our outposts, and have them put on combat readiness. They are not to engage unless fired upon. Have Lancer-Captain Kells bring the Prydwen back to the capital from Adams, and have the ship remain by the purifier.”

“Yes, Elder,” several scribes called out, before turning back to their radios, and soon, a cacophony of voices filled the room, relaying orders to Lancers, officers, and anyone else who needed to know their situation. Arthur gripped the railings overlooking the command node for several seconds, before releasing it, pivoting on his heel, and marching out. His two guards followed him silently—as silently as anyone in power armour could—flanking his side as he stepped out into the crisp spring air. The Capital Wasteland hadn’t changed much in the years since the purifier had been activated, but with the Potomac being almost entirely clean, at least in around DC itself, spring’s rad storms had been replaced with just regular storms.

On the opposite side of the courtyard, Danse was briefing his Recon Team, going over what they knew about the Commonwealth. Arthur slowed before coming to a stop. He didn’t know what was coming—it could just be the settlements trying to force to Brotherhood to accept they wanted their independence again, or something far worse could be coming. If that was the case, Arthur knew that having Danse in the field would be essential. It wasn’t even something he needed to consider.

“Paladin Danse!” He called out, “a word?”

“Of course, Elder,” Danse said, detaching from his squad and marching over to Arthur. “How may I serve, Elder?”

“Walk with me, Paladin,” he instructed, and thankfully, Danse fell into step immediately, not asking questions. “I’m postponing your mission, Danse. The situation in the Capital has now dramatically changed, and I can’t risk sending you away when there’s a chance that conflict will erupt here.”

“I understand, Elder,” Danse said faithfully, though Arthur knew he didn’t—couldn’t—until the situation was properly explained. “I’ll inform my team and return them to their units.”

“No, keep them together,” he said, “they’ll be your personal unit for the immediate future, and once this…issue, is resolved, you’ll head to the Commonwealth. As I said, the situation here has dramatically changed. I’m recalling the Prydwen from Adams and ordering the garrison there to go on lockdown. All outposts are going into a combat ready state.”

“Sir, if I may, _why_ are we preparing for war?” Danse asked once Arthur was finished. It was why Arthur appreciated his expertise. The paladin was one of his best field commanders, and had a grasp on warfare that not many wastelanders did, especially not someone who grew up as a scavenger.

“All but _two_ of the settlements under our protection have expelled their garrisons,” Arthur told him, grinding to a halt outside the door to his office, “as of right now, that’s all I know of the situation. As more information comes to light, all officers will be updated.”

“Understood, Elder. What do you need me to do?”

“Right now, I need you to make sure all our defences here are in order, Danse,” Arthur said, placing a hand on his shoulder, “and then you need to make sure that the purifier is secure. Once that’s done, report back here, and I’ll either have a new mission or news for you. Take your recon squad with you. It’ll be a good way to learn to work together.”

“Understood, sir,” Danse saluted, before returning to his squad, barking at them to gear up and follow him. Arthur watched them for several moments before he entered his personal office, the guards remaining outside. He shrugged his battle-coat off, hanging it on the hook by the door, and made his way to his desk.

The room was spartan, with a desk, three chairs, a couch, and a cot if he really needed to sleep, and nothing else. A computer terminal sat on the desk, and there were assorted files and papers, along with nearly a dozen pens. Arthur let out a deep sigh as he sat down, pinching the bridge of his nose before refocusing on the issues before him. The first file he grabbed was a request from Proctor Ingram to train two dozen new engineers among the scribes, in order to assist her with her duties. He approved it immediately, before placing it in the pile that his secretary would grab in the morning.

The next few files were simple enough requests, and he approved them too, but one made him hesitate. It was a request from a civilian—the parents of Knight Varham, requesting information on their son. Varham, like the rest of Recon Squad Artemis, had gone missing three years prior, a year into his Eldership. Varham’s parents wanted either confirmation that he was alive, or that he was dead. Arthur groaned into his hands. He couldn’t give them either, and so he placed the file aside, to be dealt with at a later date. It was the only choice he had at the moment.

Arthur just prayed that the situation didn’t escalate into all out violence.


	2. Chapter One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fresh out of the vault, Nate needs to regroup and come up with a new plan.

**Chapter One**

Things were…not going great for Nate at the moment.

His wife was dead, shot by some balding asshole when she refused to give up their son, which led to the second problem, which was that his son had been kidnapped by the aforementioned balding asshole and his team of hazmat wearing kidnappers. Then, in order to make his day even worse, he had been frozen like a steak for _two-hundred-and-something_ years. He was close to panicking, but years of experience in the army had managed to prevent a breakdown. So far.

Codsworth had assured him that no-one had found the case where he kept his rifle and sidearm, but he honestly wasn’t sure that all the screws were in the Mr. Handy’s motherboard, so he went to check for himself. The house was in shambles, but a nuclear explosion would do that, so Nate didn’t blame Codsworth for not maintaining it to the standards of the past. It was also looted to hell—or maybe it was just two hundred years’ worth of decay—because the majority of the things that had been in his house were no longer there. He paused briefly at the door to Shaun’s nursery, leaning against the doorframe and hoping to God that his legs didn’t give out, before pivoting on his heel and entering his room.

The closet had none of the clothes that had been in there the morning before—or was it the morning two hundred years before?—but the tiles at the bottom were still snugly in place, which gave him some hope. His hand ghosted over the tiles to the one in the back right corner, and he thumped it solidly, causing the floor to shift, before he pried the plate upwards. The case was still there, thankfully, and it didn’t look like it had been unlocked and closed recently, but there was a crack in it. Not big enough to do anything, but enough to let dust and air in. Hopefully, his guns would be intact, or at the very least repairable.

Vault-Tec hadn’t taken his keys from him, so he had tucked them in a pocket on the suit, and now he fished for the proper one, before inserting it into the lock, and taking a deep breath. Nate cracked the lid open and was treated with the sight of a good old-fashioned AR-15. The design was over three centuries old at this point, but Nate didn’t think he’d find a better weapon for the situation he was in. The rifle was broken down into it’s upper and lower receivers, charging handle, bolt carrier, barrel, and two empty magazines capable of holding thirty rounds, and the accompanying boxes of bullets.

In addition to the AR-15 was a Kimber 1911, another American classic. While the rifle had been something that Nate bought himself after he discharged from the Army, the Kimber had been a gift from his father-in-law after he and Nora married. Nate had been in the army for four years at that point, so the gift was seen as both practical and meaningful. He carried it for the rest of his career, and it had saved his life more than once.

“Sir,” Codsworth hovered into the room, “are your tools still in useable condition?”

_Tools_. Nora had had Codsworth reprogrammed to refer to Nate’s weapons as such. She didn’t care that he had them—she had encouraged him having them—but some of their neighbours hadn’t been as supportive of the Second Amendment, so she had made the executive decision to change it. It was better that way, they had both decided, because it prevented any arguments, and still let Codsworth remind him that he needed to clean them.

“We’re about to see, buddy,” he replied, “but let’s see if we can’t find a clean, or semi-clean, tarp or towel first.”

“Might I recommend washing something down at the river?” Codsworth suggested, “and I can use my engine to assist with the drying.”

“If you don’t burn it to a crisp, then sure, pal, I don’t see why not,” Nate conceded, before pulling the case up and resting it on the bed, before he hunted through his house for something big enough. In the end, it was one of Shaun’s baby blankets, nestled in corner, and with a layer of dust on it that had to be shaken off. Codsworth followed Nate down to the river, hovering nearby as he ran the blanket under the water, before wringing it out and shaking it again.

He held the towel out, and Codsworth floated up a respectful distance before Nate slid the blanket underneath it. Despite the flames not reaching too far, the heat did, and while it wouldn’t be completely dry, five minutes later, it was moderately less damp, and so Nate decided to risk it. The two trudged back to the house, and he lay the blanket on the bed, next to the gun-case, before lifting the parts of the AR-15 out of it and resting them on the blanket. The next thing he pulled out was the little toolbox that was also slotted into the case, and from that, he pulled a punch, small screwdriver, and file. All were still in good condition, so he began disassembling the rifle properly, taking the opportunity to check every aspect of it. He didn’t have any lubricant, so a quick clean was the best he could do at the moment. Once the rifle was done, he moved on to the Kimber, which was, admittedly, in much better condition. The foam it was resting in had prevented a lot of dust to seep in, and the rusting was almost non-existent.

Once the guns were cleaned and reassembled, he began loading the magazines, checking each bullet for deformities and other issues. Once he was all loaded, he slipped the Kimber into the holster he had taken from the Vault and slung the rifle so that it hung at his chest. The magazines went into the pouches on the holster, except for one in each weapon. Now, he was ready to investigate Concord. Codsworth had said the locals had beat him with sticks and thrown other things at him, so if he were attacked, he wanted to be prepared.

He left Codsworth behind as he crossed the bridge, and the first thing he came across were the corpses of a man and a dog with a tire-iron embedded in its skull, a rather gruesome sight. He pushed forward, ignoring the wood-and-scrap gun that rested beside the man’s body, and rounding the corner to the Red Rocket. He heard some rustling, and the rifle swung upwards, but instead of…whatever he was expecting, a German Shephard padded out of the truck stop, cocking its head to the side when it saw him. It approached him eagerly, and he knelt down to rub its ears, an action the dog enjoyed immensely.

“Hey buddy, you want to come with me?” Nate asked, and the dog wagged its tail enthusiastically, which Nate took as a _yes_ , so with one last scratch, he rose to his feet, just as the ground exploded with giant somethings emerging. The dog growled and lunged at one, jaws snapping, so he decided they probably weren’t friendly wildlife. One of the things lunged at him, and he didn’t have time to aim his rifle, so he smacked it with the butt of the gun, before angling it downwards and squeezing the trigger once, drilling a hole through the things head.

He thumbed the safety before letting go of the rifle, letting it rattle against his chest as he drew the Kimber. He carefully sighted and fired twice more, dropping another two of the rodent things, as the dog finished off another with a particularly violent bite. Nate was reminded of the dogs that he had worked with in the army, the ones who were sweeter than sugar when they were with their handlers and friends, but once in the field, they became deadly killing machines.

“Good boy!” He praised, and the dog wagged its tail again, which contrasted greatly from it’s bloody snout. “We’ll clean you up later, yeah?”

The dog barked once, so Nate decided he was happy with the arrangement. He walked into the truck stop and began rummaging around. There wasn’t much, to be honest, but Nate found some lubricant and a toolbox he’d come back for later, as well as a backpack, which he quickly slung shrugged on, before continuing his scavenger hunt. A few loose rounds and a combat knife later, he set out towards Concord, the dog trailing at his heels.

He had barely entered the town when the sound of gunshots and an energy weapon reached him. Nate took a deep breath in before peering around the corner onto Main Street. The street was littered with debris, sandbags, and a few cars, behind which people wearing scraps of leather and armour were hiding, as a man in the Museum of Freedom fired on them from a balcony. Nate didn’t have the story here, but one man holding off against around a dozen and a half was clearly not equal odds.

“Come out and die, asshole!” One of the attackers called out, and his common sense was starting to tell him that perhaps they weren’t the good guys in the situation. Beneath him, the dog growled lowly, which only furthered Nate’s beliefs. He was about to start backing away when one of the attackers spotted him, called out to his pals, and then started shooting.

“Well that resolves that issue,” he grumbled to himself, before moving the opposite direction, taking a side alley towards the museum. He took a sharp left and found two of the attackers facing the wrong way, still shooting at where he had been. “Amateurs,” he grumbled, before dropping them with three shots—two to the chest, one to the head as he got closer. He had fired seven shots from his rifle in total, which meant he had twenty-three left in the magazine, but if things became more hectic, there was a chance he would run out of bullets.

Rather than continue onto the street, Nate hopped through a window and clambered up the stairs of what used to be Old Tony’s Grocery store. He propped himself by the window and took out three more of the attackers, while the man on the balcony blew the arm off another. Nate heard a growl, and then someone screaming behind him, so he let go of the rifle, drew the Kimber, and turned, watching as the dog tore the throat out of a man. “Good boy!” He said, before holstering the pistol and turning back to the street. Balcony-Man had taken out another three men, and Nate helped by shooting two more. The rest ran, rather than continue to be gunned down. His initial assessment was right—they were amateurs.

“Hey, up here!” Balcony man called out, “on the balcony! I’ve got a group of settlers inside, and the raiders are almost through the door. Grab that laser musket and help us, please!”

And then he was gone, back inside the building. Nate hesitated, pausing by the body of the man at the door, a long weapon, presumably the laser musket in question, by his side. Nate had never been a fan of laser weapons—they weren’t as reliable as good old-fashioned gunpowder weapons in his opinion, so he had avoided them in the service, even when he had the opportunity to use them. Plus, they were bulky, and cumbersome. He took a deep breath as he considered his options.

Sure, he had helped attack these…these raiders, but that was because they had shot at him first. Did he really want to get into a confrontation again? But at the same time, Balcony-Man had said that there were civilians inside, and could Nate really live with himself if he let them die? He already knew the answer to that. He also knew what Nora would have told him to do. It wasn’t really a question at all.

Nate nudged the door open, peaking into it to make sure there was no-one immediately in front of him. Then he raised his rifle and took a tentative step in. There were several attackers—raiders, Balcony-Man had called them—on the second floor, and they were too focused on the room above him, presumably where the civilians were, to realise he was there. That was there mistake. The first one died from a single shot to the forehead, while the other actually managed to duck into cover to avoid the round that would have killed him, but Nate’s next trio of shots did the job well enough.

The dog had darted into a side room, and Nate heard screams come from it a moment later, before they abruptly cut out. He cautiously entered the room to find a dead raider on the ground, the dog sitting patiently next to the corpse. He gave him a scratch on the head before moving on. There was another raider in the next room, and this one almost managed to score a shot on Nate, but he had ducked instinctively the moment he saw a barrel, falling on his back, but he still managed to get several shots off, sending the woman tumbling backwards into the wall. He had fired…four or five rounds, and he was starting to lose track of how many bullets he had left. Maybe fifteen? He decided better safe than sorry, and instead switched the magazine out for a new one—his last one as well, but that was okay, unless there were more people in here then he expected.

He continued up the stairs, and into another room. There were two raiders in it, and he almost fired at the first one when he saw the Molotov resting on a desk next to him, a discarded lighter beside it. He gave it a quick test, and certain it worked, lit the rag and tossed it into the room. The raiders were engulfed in flames, and he had to force himself to drown out their screams as they died, rushing past him, almost as if they didn’t notice he was there, which was probably true. Nate had never been set on fire, so he didn’t know what it was like, but he imagined it wasn’t a necessarily fun feeling.

He crept up another set of stairs, and this time, he wasn’t confronted by anyone, but he could hear two raiders on the other side of the wall talking as one of them bashed against a door. There was a gap in the wall, and he saw the man ramming the door, and when his companion spoke, Nate realised he was directly across from him, the thin, wooden wall the only thing separating them. An idea sparked in his mind, and he took a step back, before raising his rifle, aiming about head-height, and squeezing the trigger twice, before instantly shifting his aim towards the hole in the wall.

“Rusty? Holy Shit!” The first raider exclaimed, and as he tentatively approached his fallen comrade, he walked right in front of Nate’s barrel. He was dead before he even realised what had happened.

He walked out the door, quickly rifled through the pockets of the dead raiders, before approaching the door and knocking. He really hoped the people on the other side would be friendly.


	3. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Preston makes a new friend, and realizes that it's probably for the best that he IS a friend.

**Chapter Two**

When the raiders inside started dropping like flies, Preston allowed himself a breath of relief. The polite knock at the door surprised him, but a quick glance out the window in the office showed that it was the man from outside, so he and Sturges removed the couch blocking the door and opened it, letting the man in. Preston hadn’t noticed the Vault-Suit at the time, because he had been more focused on the raiders trying to get through the door. But now, he had the time and mind to notice it, there were a few things he couldn’t help but notice. The suit, while covered in a small layer of dust, grime, and blood, was relatively clean, the colours bright and unworn.

“Man, I don’t know who you are, but your timing is impeccable,” he said, holding his hand out to the man. “Preston Garvey, Commonwealth Minutemen.”

“Minutemen? What is this, the renaissance fair?” The man muttered to himself, before shaking Preston’s hand, “Nate Thiel. No affiliations.”

“Well, thank you, Nate,” he said, “you really saved our asses just now. I don’t know how much longer I could’ve held them.”

“It’s no issue,” Nate assured him, “Once, I swore an oath to protect the innocent. I still stand by that oath.”

Maybe he had been Vault-Security. That was the only reason Preston could come up with for him swearing an oath to protect the innocent. “Look, uh, the raiders will be back, and they’ll come with more numbers than originally. I hate to press my luck, but I could really use the help.”

“Whatever you need, Preston, I’ll do what I can,” Nate swore, “so what _can_ I do?”

Preston hesitated, thinking about what Nate actually could do. Before he came up with an answer, Sturges spoke up. “How good of a shot are you?”

“I was certified as a marksman,” Nate said, before lifting his rifle slightly and motioning to the flip sights, “but the sights on this aren’t really that great.”

“If you’re okay with it, I may have something to help with that,” Sturges offered, “I’ve been luggin’ around an old ACOG sight…it was a project for one of the Minutemen but…well, he ain’t got a need for it anymore. It’ll need a few adjustments for your rifle, but I reckon I can get it done in…five, maybe ten minutes?”

Nate hesitated, and Preston knew exactly what the root would be, or at least one of them—he carried himself like a soldier, and just handing off his rifle to someone wouldn’t sit right with him, the chance of the gun being used against him aside. So Preston did what felt right. He spoke up. “Look, I know you don’t have a lot of reason to trust us, but we’re desperate. A month ago, there were twenty of us. This morning, there were eight. Sturges is one of the best mechanics in the Commonwealth, and I promise you he won’t screw up your rifle. You don’t have to say yes, but like I said, we’re desperate. We need help bad. I can’t do this alone.”

“Alright Preston,” Nate nodded, lifting the rifle’s sling over his shoulder, before ejecting the magazine, and the chambered round, before handing it over to Sturges, who bustled over to a clear desk, before fishing through his pack, before finding the scope in question. While he did this, Nate wandered the room, his hand always close to the holster that held his side-arm.

“Dogmeat!” Mama Murphy greeted the dog happily, “good job!”

“He’s a smart dog,” Nate said, “vicious, too, but incredibly smart. He reminds me of…well, he reminds me of some of the dogs I worked with in the past.”

“You’re not what I expected Dogmeat to find in that little neighbourhood, but oh, so much better,” Mama Murphy continued, “hail the conquering hero. He he he.”

“Just trying to do what’s right, ma’am,” Nate replied, his face slightly flushed.

“You’re a hero, boy,” Mama Murphy corrected him, “or, you will be, soon enough. I’ve seen it.”

“You’ve…seen it,” he said, bemused.

“Among other things,” Mama nodded, “the one you’re looking for is out there, but you won’t find him as fast as you want to. Life will hit you harder than you thought. You’ll be forced to make hard decisions, and each one will delay you. But you will find him, one day.”

Nate had stiffened immediately, but Mama Murphy pressed on, clearly not intimidated in the slightest by his change in posture. “I know it’s not what you wanted to hear, Nathaniel, but you _did_ need to hear it.”

“I didn’t tell you my full name,” Nate said quietly.

“I told you, I saw it,” Mama Murphy repeated, “I wasn’t expecting to meet you, ever, but I have seen you before.”

“Yeah, okay, and how exactly do you ‘see’ me?”

“It’s almost always chems that allow me to use the Sight,” she explained, “but rarely, incredibly rarely, I can use it without outside stimulus.”

“And let me guess, I was one of those times?” Nate scoffed.

“No, you were a Jet trip,” Mama laughed. “The last time I had an unprompted vision, it was to let me know about the assassin that was trying to kill me.”

“Wait, what?” Marcy interrupted, “someone sent an assassin after you?”

“Sure, it happened all the time when I was younger,” Mama shrugged, “people didn’t like me back then. I was dangerous.”

“Alright,” Sturges cut in, thankfully, and Preston was beyond glad for it, “I’ve got the ACOG on and calibrated it for you, and I also took the liberty of giving you a grip-pod, from another customer who won’t need it. It should make your shooting much easier.”

“Thank you, Sturges,” Nate said, taking the weapon back. He used the window in the office to test it out, before the bipod in the grip shot out, letting him test it on the frame. He seemed happy with the result. “Great work. What do you want me to do now?”

“Some sort of air vehicle crashed onto the roof when the bombs dropped,” Preston told him, “created a nice little opening to shoot from—and you can use the thing for protection as well. There’s a minigun, but it’s not close enough to shoot out onto the street.”

“I’ll set my rifle up there, then,” Nate said, “But from what I saw of that spot, I’ll only have a line of sight down Main Street. If they come from the north-east or south-west, I won’t see them.”

“I’ll set up on the balcony again,” Preston told him, “and I’ll watch those approaches. If anyone makes it in, I’ll turn to the window here and use it to take care of them.”

“Sounds good,” Nate nodded, “I’ll see what I can set up there. Good luck, Preston.”

“You too, Nate. I’ll see you on the flipside.”

**XXXX**

It was an hour before the rest of the raiders showed up. They were slightly more organised than the first wave that had attacked, spreading out through the town, and staying behind cover as they moved forward. These were clearly the more experienced raiders—perhaps some of them had once been Minutemen even—and they knew what they were doing. Preston hoped that Nate was as good as he had been inside the Museum.

The raiders stopped short of the ten-yard gap of open space that separated the door to the Museum from the street. One of the raiders, the leader, likely, called out to Preston.

“Listen, Minuteman, we just want the old lady,” he called out, “if you give her to us, we’ll let you leave.”

That was a lie, and everyone involved knew it. The response came from Nate, and it was in the form of a bullet drilling in the leader’s forehead. The two raiders next to their boss dropped next, and that was when Preston added his own fire into the mix. There was only so much two people could do, and while Nate did have a higher rate of fire than Preston, he picked his shots selectively. Preston hadn’t actually seen him miss yet, and that itself was impressive. The raiders were slowly but consistently whittled down, and each one of their number that fell to either a bullet or laser was a slight tip of the scales in Preston and the others favour.

Before the last raider fell, however, there was a terrifying roar from the back of town. Preston had never encountered a Deathclaw before, but he had heard the stories from the more veteran Minutemen in Colonel Hollis’ company before Quincy. He knew them by reputation and camp-fire horror stories, but he had never actually seen one before.

The Deathclaw tore around the corner, and literally ripped a raider in half as it tried to flee, before its jaws snapped forward, killing another. Several bricks fell from the roof, so Preston spared a quick glance upwards to see Nate repositioning from wherever he had been shooting from.

“Preston, what the hell is that?” He yelled down from the roof.

“Deathclaw!” He called back up, “scary dangerous. We need it gone sooner rather than later.”

“Does it have any weaknesses?”

“Go for the brain? I don’t know, Nate, I’ve never run into one before!”

If Nate responded, it was lost in the screams of the dying raiders. A trio of shots rang out from above him, and two of them landed on the monster’s head, doing nothing more than irritating it and making it drop the corpse in its mouth. Preston cranked his laser musket several times more than he usually would before lining up a shot and taking it. The overcharged laser beam slammed into the Deathclaw’s head and staggered the creature. Above him, Nate fired again, and a half-second later, released another shot. The combination of the overcharged beam and the staggered shots had a more pronounced effect. The Deathclaw stumbled forwards several steps before crashing down, flattening a raider who had been injured with a horrific crunch.

There was a moment of silence, which lingered on, and on, and on, and only then did Preston realise that all the raiders were dead or had fled. He let out a deep, shuddering breath before he re-entered the building. Nate was a heartbeat behind him, calm and collected, clearly having recovered from his shock at seeing a Deathclaw for presumably the first time.

“It’s clear,” Preston told the survivors, “we should have a straight shot to Sanctuary now. It can’t be more than a day away.”

“Sanctuary?” Nate blinked, “why are you going to Sanctuary?”

“It’s far from the Gunners and raiders,” Preston explained, “and it’s been abandoned as long as anyone can remember, which means no one will think to look for us there, yet.”

“It’s only about forty minutes away, at a steady pace,” Nate then said, after several moments, “I can lead you there. Help you get settled, but then I’ve got to keep going. I’m…I’m looking for someone.”

“Any help at all would be appreciated,” Preston said, pausing a moment, before reaching into his rucksack and pulling out a small pouch of caps. Fifty, of the two-hundred and fifty he had left. Small to some, but large to him. “Here. For what you’ve done already.”

Nate stared at the pouch, clearly recognising it as compensation but seemingly confused by what was being offered. Preston felt a bit awkward, just standing there, but Marcy Long cleared her throat impatiently, and it seemed to shake the Vault-Dweller from his stupor.

“Ah, no thank you,” he settled on, “keep it. I have a feeling you’ll need it far more than I will. Let’s just…get to Sanctuary, and then we’ll play it by ear from there, yeah?”

“Sure,” Preston said, more than a little happy that the man had turned down the caps. “So what Vault are you from?”

“Uh, One-Eleven,” Nate told him.

“What was it like? I’ve heard that most of the vaults were experiments of some sort, with only a few control vaults in the entire pre-war United States.”

“It was…cold,” Nate said quietly, “I…went in with my wife and son, as the bomb was dropped. They put us in pods that froze us. I only woke up this morning.”

“Oh my god,” realisation struck Preston and the others quickly, and he could see the look of horror on Sturges’ face as he put two-and-two together, “you’re from before the bombs fell?”

Nate looked away, his face twisting into a grimace.

“I am.”

**Author's Note:**

> Just a short prologue to introduce an aspect of the story. Let me know what you think!


End file.
